A Study to Identify Relationship between Resilience and Psychosocial Adaptation in Patients with Cancer in Selected Hospitals of Belgaum City, Karnataka

Abstract

Cancer is second largest non-communicable disease and diagnosing an individual with cancer is a traumatic life event. The World Cancer Report (WHO 2003) tells us that cancer rates are set to increase at an alarming rate globally and it would increase by 50% to 15 million by 2020. With continued improvements in medicine and public health and technological advances, the number of survivors of serious illness has increased in many countries. The number of cancer survivors has increased because of increased and earlier cancer detection, more effective treatments, and the aging of society. With increasing numbers of survivors in society, providers, researchers, and health policy makers have recognized that there is a great need to understand how people adapt positively to health challenges and to identify effective approaches for helping people cope with health challenges over their lifetime. Hence the present study intends to identify relationship between resilience and psychosocial adaptation among cancer patients. The Objectives of the Study: (1) To identify the resilience of patients diagnosed with cancer as measured by Standardized Dispositional Resilience scale. (2) To assess the domains of psychosocial adaptation as measured by WHO Quality of Life—BREF scale and Standardized Symptom check list. (3) To find the correlation between resilience with psychosocial adaptation in patients diagnosed with cancer. Methods: The conceptual framework adopted for the study was based on Roy’s adaptation model. The concepts of the theory were: input, processes, effectors and output. In view of the nature of the problem selected and objectives to be fulfilled, Descriptive correlational research design was used for the study. Convenience sampling technique was used to select 60 cancer patients from Belgaum cancer Hospital. Data was collected by means of a 3 standardized questionnaire which was divided into sections namely Socio-demographic Pro-forma, Dispositional resilience scale, Symptom checklist and WHO Quality of Life BREF scale. The pilot study was conducted on 6 cancer patients of KLE’s Dr. Prabhakar Kore Hospital and MRC, Belgaum, in the month of December 2011. Main study data was conducted among 60 cancer patients of Belgaum cancer Hospital, Belgaum, in the month of January and February 2012 and analysis was done using descriptive statistics in terms of frequency, percentage, mean, median, mode, standard deviation and Spearman’s coefficient of rank correlation. Result: The major findings indicated that there was a negative correlation between resilience and psychological distress and positive correlation between resilience and quality of life. This indicates that, in resilient patients there was less psychological distress and higher perceived quality of life.